Midnight Online Junkies

MidnightOnline Junkies

by Chelle Stockman

Contrary to popular belief, not all people in online chatrooms are sexual deviates, repressed people who require medication, or adulterers.  The most intelligent people gifted in argument can be found in the after Midnight crowd.  My personal choices are the writer's chat rooms.  Their advice to me regarding self publishing versus mainstream publishing is priceless.  But more interesting are the topics we cover and argue in great length. 

 

Conspicuous in their absence were our chat friends from Florida.They are facing the demise of their second major hurricane.  The topic became Global Warming trends.  It sent me off to find the reports as to how CO2 affects our earth because Natural Gas is the global trend for energy.

 

In 1998 the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine's study of Natural Gas reported that while there is a marked increase of CO2 into our atmosphere the affect is likely to be benign because it increases microbes and plant life on earth which is necessary to handle the fast growth of our population.  They feel this is a good thing and say, "What mankind is doing is liberating carbon from beneath the Earth's surface and putting it into the atmosphere, where it is available for conversion into living organisms."  They do admit that our ozone layer is diminishing at a faster rate but that too is good for vegetation.

Further research shown by Ramakrishna Nemani, a climate change researcher, corroborates the findings of OISM, but notes that it has increased our cloud cover which traps harmful radiation beneath, leaving all life on the ground level up for compromised immunities. His fears are that we will see an accelerated reversal of growth we now experience and cites that this reversal has begun in the Amazon basins already.

 

 So I sent this to the chat room and they all began to argue whether or not it was bogus.  Several went to investigate the assertions.  Meanwhile CNN just announced that Hurricane Ivan is on its way.

 

This doesn't surprise Hillary Mayell of National Geographic News as she reports the many ways our weather is affected; and interviews expert, Christopher Milly an atmospheric scientist for the U. S. Geological Survey. Milly explains that flood cycles occur in 100 year cycles as a rule but then says in the findings, “By definition, a 100-year flood is really extreme and rare. What we can observe when we look at those records is that the number of these extreme flooding events occurred disproportionately in the last decades of the 20th century. The difference is large enough to make you raise your eyebrows. It's hard to believe it could happen by chance, enough that it's worth looking for other reasons why there were so many floods in the last few decades."

 

The cracking of a 200mile piece of iceberg on March 15 in 2002 was directly related to global warming trends also causing the ocean to rise at an alarming rate; yet it is something a few researchers in high governmental places refuse to pay attention to.  This is enough to make me ask, "How much evidence must we have before we admit that our actions on this earth are also our demise?"

 

As the people in the chat room began to switch to politics and our research went from global warming to sexual habits of monkeys in Ethiopia, I couldn't help but think how odd our weather has been.  I also wondered about the Killer bees, the locust plagues in Chad(this past week) and the new viruses transmitted from one species to another.   I don't see this trend reversing anymore than I see the  ponderings of frustrated researchers in the confines of Internet chatrooms coming to an end. 

 

Online living may have its dangers and disintegrated moral implications, but when used properly to extract and weigh out truths, it becomes addicting and a most valuable tool.  Dare to seek out answers people.  Don't take the word of others without doing research.  Make the time.  Whether it is at midnight, or any other time of day, you will encounter online junkies like me.  My hope is you will experience what a wonderful tool the Internet is when you use it for more noble pursuits.